1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a monitoring management apparatus that performs monitoring and management of a communication system to which wireless devices are connected, a monitoring management method, and a computer-readable device storing a monitoring management program.
Priority is claimed on Japanese Patent Application No. 2010-283215, filed Dec. 20, 2010, the content of which is incorporated herein by reference.
2. Description of the Related Art
All patents, patent applications, patent publications, scientific articles, and the like, which will hereinafter be cited or identified in the present application, will hereby be incorporated by reference in their entirety in order to describe more fully the state of the art to which the present invention pertains.
A field device, which is a kind of a wireless device, includes a sensor device such as a flowmeter or a temperature sensor, a valve device such as a flow control valve or an on-off valve, an actuator device such as a fan or a motor, and other devices installed in a plant or a factory. Most conventional field devices transmit/receive various signals such as measurement signals or control signals via wired field buses installed in a plant or the like. In recent years, wireless field devices that transmit/receive various signals in a wireless manner according to an industrial wireless communication standard such as ISA100.11a or Wireless HART have been realized.
The wireless communication standard ISA100.11a is an industrial automation wireless communication standard established by the International Society of Automation (ISA). The Wireless HART is a wireless communication standard proposed by the Highway Addressable Remote Transducer (HART) Communication Foundation of the USA. Since wireless field devices conforming to the wireless communication standards can perform wireless communication, it is possible to facilitate installation and the like at places where wiring of a wired field bus is difficult or wiring construction is not economical.
A communication system conforming to the wireless communication standard ISA100.11a mainly includes a wireless device, a gateway, a system manager, and a monitoring management apparatus. The wireless device includes the above-mentioned wireless field device and the like, and transmits/receives a wireless packet to/from the gateway. The gateway connects a wired network, to which the system manager is connected, to a wireless network to which the wireless device is connected, and relays a packet transmitted/received between the system manager and the wireless device.
The system manager integrally manages the communication system by performing management and the like of various types of information necessary for communicating with the wireless device. The monitoring management apparatus is manipulated by a manager of the communication system, and performs display and the like of the various types of information managed by the system manager while performing various settings corresponding to an instruction of the manager with respect to the system manager. Japanese Unexamined Patent Application, First Publication No. 2009-260451 discloses a communication system in which sensor nodes for measuring a physical amount such as temperature or a flow rate are connected to a monitoring system for monitoring these sensor nodes via a gateway node.
In general, in a communication system installed in a plant and the like, wireless communication paths are established between a gateway and a plurality of wireless devices, so that communication is performed between the gateway and the plurality of wireless devices. At the time of a test or emergency of the communication system, communication between wireless devices other than a specific wireless device, and a gateway is interrupted, so that a priority may be given to communication of the specific wireless device.
For example, a connection confirmation test when a wireless network of a communication system is constructed or a test for confirming whether a packet received in a wireless device is accurately managed is performed in the state in which communication by wireless devices, other than by a wireless device to be tested, has been interrupted. Furthermore, at the time of an emergency such as natural disaster, it is necessary to quickly perform communication with a high priority even when communication with a low priority is interrupted. The communication with a high priority, for example, includes transmission of control data for performing the opening and closing and the like of a valve. If exchange of wireless devices is performed, communication by wireless devices, other than by a wireless device to be exchanged, is interrupted.
Communication between the gateway and the wireless devices is interrupted by the system manager if a manager manipulates the monitoring management apparatus to select one wireless device and gives an instruction to interrupt communication of the selected wireless device. However, in order to interrupt communication by wireless devices, other than by a specific wireless device, since it is necessary for the manager to give the above instruction to all wireless devices, other than the specific wireless device, much effort and time are required and it is difficult to cope with an emergency situation. Furthermore, since efforts for indicating wireless devices whose communication is to be interrupted, have increased as the size of a communication system has increased, it is highly probable for an erroneous operation to occur.